We Are Displaced

Listeners will especially enjoy the foreword of this audiobook, narrated by Malala Yousafzai, in which she acknowledges that her well-known background will provide context for the many personal stories of loss that are told by refugee girls. Before each affecting story, listeners are given a brief introduction that recounts how Malala met the contributor. These intros provide consistency as the same narrator, Neela Vaswani, reads them. They include several passages that have been updated for the audio edition. Deepti Gupta delivers most of the interviews of the girls, and the occasional affectations and accents she uses to differentiate them can be distracting and take away from the stories, which are affecting on their own. Nonetheless, this is a painful and powerful listening experience that imparts current and historical events with emotional depth. E.J.F. � AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine

September 1, 2019

Gr 7 Up-As a displaced person and refugee, Yousafzai provides a knowledgeable introduction to the international refugee and immigration crisis through both her own experience and through the stories of the girls and young women she chronicles in this timely work. Refugees seeking freedom from physical, emotional, and sexual terror, trauma, and danger describe their lives before, during, and after their escapes as they seek a better life for themselves and their families. Descriptions of lives in detention and in refugee camps are of particular interest for those following the crisis on our own Southern border. Another focus of the work is that of the education of girls. Yousafzai reads her own prologue, and two dynamic narrators, Neela Vaswani and Deepti Gupta, perform stories of young women from Myanmar, the Congo, Iraq, Syria, and Colombia. While geared to mature middle and high school level listeners, this is an audiobook that could be listened to and discussed in a guided family or school setting. VERDICT Anyone who wants to learn more about immigration and refugees will benefit from this telling.-Ann Brownson, formerly with Eastern Illinois University, Charleston, IL

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